Friday the 13th Part 2 is a 1981 slasher film directed by Steve Miner, who also directed its sequel, Friday the 13th Part III. A sequel to the 1980 film Friday the 13th, it is the second film in the Friday the 13th film series. It was a moderate box-office hit, opening on May 1, 1981 in first place. The film was the first to feature Jason Voorhees (Warrington Gillette, doubled by Steve Daskawisz) as the main antagonist, a trend which would be repeated for the rest of the series.

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Plot

Two months following the massacre at Camp Crystal Lake in the original film, Alice L. Hardy is trying to put her life together again. While feeding her cat, she discovers the severed head of Pamela Voorhees in her refrigerator before an unseen killer inserts an ice pick in her skull and kills her.

Five years later, a man named Jeff, his girlfriend Sandra, and Jeff's friend Ted are on their way to a Counselor Training center that is opening up at Crystal Lake, not far from the infamous campground. Despite its infamy and the police frowning on the location, Paul collects a group of would-be counselors to train. Good girls Terry and Vicki, prankster Scott, and wheelchair bound Mark, despite warnings from local Crazy Ralph, also arrive. Paul's girlfriend and assistant Ginny Field arrives late, much to his chagrin. As the day progresses, inspired by the legend of Jason Voorhees whose story was told at a camp fire the night before, Sandra and Jeff sneak over to explore the abandoned camp, only to be caught by the sheriff (not knowing that Crazy Ralph was just strangled with a strip of barbwire). After leaving them in Paul's care, he witnesses a man running through the woods and chases him to a dilapidated shack where he makes a particularly gruesome discovery (unseen to the viewer) before being killed by the claw of a hammer rammed into his skull.

That night, Paul and Ginny take the counselors for one last night on the town; Sandra and Jeff, being punished for their excursion earlier are volunteered to stay behind; Terry decides to stay behind and look for her missing dog Muffin while Scott volunteers to put the moves on Terry. Wheelchair-bound Mark decides to stay as well and Vicki, smitten with Mark, decides to stay. While searching for Muffin, Terry goes skinny dipping and Scott plays a prank on her by stealing her clothes before being caught in one of Paul's survival traps. Terry goes to get a knife to cut him down, but the killer slits his throat with a machete and kills Terry (off screen) when she returns and discovers him dead. At the bar, Ginny imagines what Jason would be like if he were alive, deducing he had seen his mother murdered and would be a vengeful creature unaware of the meaning of life and death. Paul dismisses her concerns and tells her that he is only a legend, his insistence hinting that Jason is the one responsible for the killings.

As it begins raining heavily back at the camp, the killer murders Mark with a machete to the face and pushes his chair down a flight of stairs. He then moves upstairs and kills Jeff and Sandra as they are having sex by double impalement with a spear. When Vicki returns for Mark she finds Sandra and Jeff's bodies and is then stabbed by the killer, who is revealed to be wearing a sack over his head with an eyehole cutout. Paul and Ginny return from town to discover the aftermath. Paul is attacked by the killer, who then chases Ginny through the camp. She finds her way to the shack and enters to find an altar with Mrs. Voorhees' mummified head on it, surrounded by the bodies of the victims. The killer is revealed to be none other than Jason himself, who apparently didn't drown after all.

Using her child psychology to her advantage, she puts on Pamela's sweater and manages to convince Jason that she is his mother. The ruse fails when he spots his mother's head, but Paul intervenes, distracting Jason long enough for Ginny to take the machete and bring it down several inches into his shoulder. Jason falls over, presumably dead. Ginny and Paul uncover his disfigured face before taking shelter in a nearby cabin. Muffin then appears at the cabin door, and while Ginny reaches down to pick her up, Jason (now unmasked, with the machete still in his shoulder) bursts through the window behind her and attacks her. Ginny wakes up the next morning, confused and being pulled aboard an ambulance with no recollection of how she escaped. She calls for Paul, who is nowhere to be seen, and she is driven off to the hospital. The final scene then switches over to show Mrs. Voorhees' head, before ultimately fading to black.